| FWIW -
I've always wondered about quintuples and why they cause so many problems. I finally realized that every time I ran into them, I subconsiously "stiffened" because I never knew how they really should feel.
Finally, I added them as part of my daily warmup routine. I wanted to make them feel as comfortable as four sixteenths. I started by single-tonguing quintuples on low C, one group at a time and going down to low F# and back up. The pulse was always on the first note and I just let the tongue "bounce" the five notes. Then I expanded to two, three, four and five groups of five on each note. First, I started slowly, then I worked for as much speed as I could get.
Once that became comfortable, I started doing the Clarke Second Study doing quintuples on each note. I found I had to concentrate on what note I was playing and had to get to the point where my body simply played the quintuplet without conscious thought.
Finally, after some time I'd pick my horn up and do some single tonguing practice to relax and have to stop to think what pattern I'd just played. When I was playing quintuples without thinking about it, I decided maybe I was finally getting more comfortable with them. Now, when sight-reading and running into quintuples, I don't tense up and feel more like I just play the phrase.
One of my favorite etude books (Albert Mancini's "Etudes and Caprices" - not a common book at all) that has lots of odd-meter etudes has one in 10/16 that is all two quintuples per measure. That is really fun to play. I also practice it with Manny's suggestion of TKTKT TKTKT.
Someday maybe I'll start on sevens, elevens and thirteens. |